2: Don't try to be Skyrim
Frankly, I am terrified by the open-world concept. Director Konrad Tomaszkiewicz comments in the announcement video, "everyone likes open-world games, we should go this way." Should they? I'm not so sure. Aside from the tremendous difficulties Point 3 brings up, there's the fact that while there's only really been one series that has truly made open-world RPGs work - the Elder Scrolls games - their exploration value hides a lot of flaws, most notably in storytelling. While I like the idea that CD Projekt have looked at Skyrim and gone "we want to do that", Bethesda have been perfecting the art of open-world RPGs since 1992 and they still haven't gotten it perfect. The idea of marrying the incredible openness of Skyrim to the attention to detail of The Witcher is an intoxicating idea, but only as long as CD Projekt know what they're getting into. In short: don't make another Skyrim guys, make your own great open-world game. And finally…

And here's their idea # 11:

9: Actually tell us about important Witcher things
Thanks to CD Projekt’s work I am now a fan of Polish author Andrzej Sapkowski’s excellent original novels too, but you can’t assume that all players will be familiar with them. Peter Jackson’s Lord of the Rings films still tell and show us why Mordor is a threat, and HBO’s Game of Thrones has done a great job making sure TV viewers are scared of the White Walkers as George RR Martin fans already were.
Therefore, please CD Projekt tell (or better, show) us why we should hear the name “Nilfgaard” and shudder as we utterly failed to do in either of the games. Nilfgaard is a brutal empire that inspires fear and is regularly at war with the rest of Temeria in Sapkowski’s books, but they’re just a random location with an ugly ambassador in The Witcher 2. Let players know these things, and if Witcher 3 fails to explain who Yennefer is properly I’ll be cross.

That being said, CDP hardly makes perfect games, and I do agree with most of the list. Especially:
- Savegame imports.
- Witcher stuff. The Witchers are pretty interesting, but we generally don't get to know a lot about them.
- Don't let consoles decide what to do.
- Don't try to be Skyrim.

The game was my first taste of the stetting and made me watch the polish movie and tv series subbed in English.The books aren't even fully translated in English six years later. Damn slow pokes.

I red one of the books, I think there are two of them translated, but maybe more since then. I don't find it that very strange (just annoying): the spanish swashbuckling series El Capitan Alatriste is also a few books behind schedule, although there is a movie that, even though it is a co-production, stars Viggo Mortensen as the main character.

Originally Posted by Couchpotato
The problem is words don't always translate well and you have to substitute words. Still it shouldn't take six years to translate books already written.

Then what do I know since Atlus claims they need three years to translate one game. I'll have to check out the El Capitan Alatriste series you talked about in the meantime.

You probably would change your opinion on the matter if you consider the fact that CDP does not own Witcher franchise. It's not like Elder Scrolls or Mass Effect where Bethesda and Bioware holding everything in their hands. Witcher as a brand and franchise on the contrary belongs to pan Andrzej Sapkowski. CDP has no influence over books and all related matters. These very circumstances may cause some trouble ahead. Sapkowski is writing a new book about Geralt and his vision of the story would probably not be eye to eye to CDP version. So it's more now sort of race in the time on who is to be the first presenting new chapter in Geralt's story. It's important because by being first this version will get a canonical status and would greatly influence (positively or negatively) the perception of the second.

Originally Posted by mazur49
You probably would change your opinion on the matter if you consider the fact that CDP does not own Witcher franchise. It's not like Elder Scrolls or Mass Effect where Bethesda and Bioware holding everything in their hands. Witcher as a brand and franchise on the contrary belongs to pan Andrzej Sapkowski. CDP has no influence over books and all related matters. These very circumstances may cause some trouble ahead. Sapkowski is writing a new book about Geralt and his vision of the story would probably not be eye to eye to CDP version. So it's more now sort of race in the time on who is to be the first presenting new chapter in Geralt's story. It's important because by being first this version will get a canonical status and would greatly influence (positively or negatively) the perception of the second.

Yes very insightful but I already said the games and books have nothing to do with each other. My reply was for MigRib not the game itself.

They author and the English publishers had six years to translate all the novels and barely have three available in English. I'm not counting the fan translations.

Yes very insightful but I already said the games and books have nothing to do with each other. My reply was for MigRib not the game itself.

They author and the English publishers had six years to translate all the novels and barely have three available in English. I'm not counting the fan translations.

Ouch, six years sounds like a lot of time for ten books (more or less). I'm no translator, but I know several and if they took that long they would living on the streets by now… I suppose it has something to do with yhe polish language - or else, they don't think it will make much money translated. Anyway, from what I red until now - which is only The Last Wish - it looks that the games are being faithful to the spirit of the books. They aren't quite fantasy, as in the average american fantasy writer. The stories apear to be more about fables mixed up with some mythical, religious and fantasy stuff, but portraying themes that are very modern, like xenophobia, addictions, segregation, famine and disease in impoverished areas, complicated relationships, and so on. The satyrical tone does seem to be well balanced too.

I agree with most of the things in this editorial, but I get the feeling that it was unnecessary to state all that. Most of the points probably were discussed when the previous entries in The Witcher saga were published and they are mostly common sense. So, I suppose the important point is the open world thing. I have little info on that, I have no knowledge of game design and game industry, but after seeing the CDPR videos I (being a journalist - even an unemployed one) got the feeling that they were courting the press. They talk too much about Skyrim (nowadays if you want to get the attention of the press talking about an open world just mention Skyrim. The same happened with Far Cry 3). They talk too much about other Bethesda's game. It would be great iif they could combine the open world of Bethesda with the story-driven Bioware games, but I suppose that's not really possible - or it might be possible, but impractical, too long to prepare and make and way too expensive. Are they really trying to do an story-driven open world Witcher 3? I don't know, but I doubt they will try to do something like Skyrim. It looks more like a marketing approach. Of course they will have to make a much bigger world, and make it open from the beggining, or else they will be accused of being lying before.

Originally Posted by mazur49
Sapkowski is writing a new book about Geralt and his vision of the story would probably not be eye to eye to CDP version.

While that is true even Sapkowski doesn't see eye to eye with Sapkowski. Up until Hussite Trylogy he was a talented short stories writter but only a mediocre novelist. Compared to stories collected in The Witcher and Sword of Destiny his The Saga (5 Witcher books) starts ok and gets messy and incoherent as it progresses…